"Nay, not bad, in fact I thought him rather cheerful, as far as one can guess. I read to him, his usual Montaigne, and then a little from the Religio because he seemed to be listening and enjoying it. When Kate relieved me I think he was not far from sleep. Ah, how long, Amadeus?"
"No one could possibly say. I once knew the apoplexy to leave a woman quite motionless and yet alive for six years. Others go in a few moments, a few weeks. And there are remissions, don't forget. It's no mere word of comfort to say that he might recover his speech, even the use of his left side, or partial use. I've seen that happen. Or it might be that when he falls asleep tonight, or some night, he won't wake."
"He said once—if I rightly understood the words, but he was excited, trying too hard to speak, and so they were difficult—he said he could not die until Ben comes home."
"Well.... The mere thought of it might do much to keep him in this world a while. Nobody understands the power of the mind over the flesh—or ought I to say, over the rest of the flesh? Or the power of flesh over the mind. We don't know, we don't know."
"I know it is May, and a misty night."
"Yes, and thou art here."
"And I think I enjoy the misty nights, Amadeus, mm, even the nights when the moon's down as much as the others, and I've wondered why, and I think I know the reason. I enjoy them because I know that, while others are sometimes afraid of the dark, I am not. I can tell you, I can tell you surely, I'm not afraid of anything in nature. Am I speaking nonsense, I wonder? Why, before a lion my flesh would cringe and squeak, I don't doubt it, but somewhere, Amadeus, somewhere in here there's a part of me would hold calm and yield nothing even to the thought of mine own death."
"Have I not alway known that, in thee?"
"You have?"
"Yes."